The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind (PG)
There is a very good reason why George Lucas did not name his groundbreaking space movie The Boy who Blows up the Death Star, or why Steven Spielberg didn’t call his breakthrough 1975 thriller The Man Who Kills a Giant Shark. In what world is it a good idea to give away the ending of your movie in its title?
Yet this is exactly what Netflix has done with its newest release, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind.
The film is based on the true story of William Kamkwamba — the Malawian schoolboy who built a wind turbine using little more than scrap, some library books and his own genius — but only the ending has anything to do with wind power.
The Boy Who... stars Oscar-nominated British actor Chiwetel Ejiofor — best known for his leading role in 12 Years a Slave — as William’s father, the aptly named Trywell, who works hard on his remote farm to earn enough money to send his teenage son to school and his eldest daughter to university. The family is just about keeping its head above water when a drought destroys the family’s crops and the starving region descends into chaos as people fight over what little grain is available.
It is at this point where the movie comes to life, where the small story of village life begins to ask big questions. What is the right thing to do in such circumstances? Should parents starve to feed their children? Should you turn your back on your neighbour to put your own family first? Should the trees that help protect the land be cut down and sold to enable families to buy food, even if that increases the likelihood that crops will fail in the future?
It becomes a story about more than just a family, it is about community, identity, culture, ethics, morality, corruption and dignity.
Eventually, from the seemingly hopeless abyss, comes the resolution — that these poor Africans have the brains, ingenuity and fortitude to save themselves, without any assistance from the outside world.
It is a rewarding watch. The script is good, although not spectacular; the characters are believable, and the understated acting from the largely Malawian cast is generally excellent, with debutant Maxwell Simba faultless as the stoic genius of the title.
Ejiofor has done a decent job in his first film as writer and director, particularly by creating a sense of place, identity and community amid the African heat and dust. Filming in the real William’s village was a wise move, providing an authenticity that would have otherwise been hard to replicate.
And despite the fact that we know what will happen — that wind power will save the day — the denouement remains satisfying and inspiring, simply because the real William’s achievements were so incredible.
However, from a cinematic perspective, the ending is a missed opportunity. Despite the life-or-death stakes involved, we know that the boy will harness the wind, so what could have been unbearable tension is absent. And this fact gives the final scenes the feel of a slightly amateurish TV movie.
This is probably why The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is merely a good film, rather than a great one.
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is available on Netflix worldwide from 1 March.
